As explicitly stated in International Publication No. WO 01/55491 and as shown in FIGS. 7 and 8, the inventor of the present invention has proposed a knitting method for non-sewing knitwear, with which a front neckline 310 being broad in a forwardly hanging manner is formed on a breast 100a by using a flat knitting machine. The machine has at least a pair of front and back needle beds extending to the right and left direction and facing each other in the front and back direction, with at least one of the front and back needle beds being capable of sideways racking and capable of loop transfer of knitted loops between the front and back needle beds.
This proposal is basically such that, after a torso 100 (10a, 100b) and both sleeves 210(210a, 21b) and 220(220a, 220b) are cylindrically knitted from the hem to the armpits of knitwear and, when the breast 100a is knitted, the front neckline 310 is formed on the breast 100a by knitting the breast 100a such that the breast 100a is branched off into right and left breasts 110a and 120a so as to sandwich the neckline 300 from the start line of forming the neckline 300 (the dotted line L1 shown in FIG. 8).
Then, in order to broadly form the neckline, during the process of knitting the right and left breasts 110a and 120a (from the dotted line L2 shown in FIG. 8), by repeating an operation of returning all knitted loops of the back to the original needle bed after all knitted loops of the right or left breast 11a or 120a are transferred to the needle bed having knitted loops of the back retained thereat and racking of the transferred needle bed is performed so as to achieve knitting for gradually moving knitted loops of the right or left breast 110a or 120a outward with respect to the center of the torso, increases of the front neckline 310 are formed along the periphery 300.
Further, the knitted loops of the front neckline 310 are further increased by using several knitted loops of the final course of each of the right and left breasts 110a and 120a from its end close to the neckline to point L3 shown in FIG. 8 for knitting the neckline.
By forming the front neckline 310 as described above, the number of wales of the front neckline 310 is increased. As a result, not only a collar 400 which is sequentially knitted has a neckline with a large bore, but also the neckline 300 is spontaneously formed in a forwardly hanging state.
When a sweater is produced by using the breast 100a knitted so as to have the broad neckline 300 as described above, the sweater is highly fashionable and comfortable to wear since a wearer can easily get his or her head through the collar during wearing and is not tightened by the collar.
However, with the above described knitting method, in order to form increases at the neckline, all knitted loops of the right or left breast 110a or 120a are transferred to the needle bed having the knitted loops of the back retained thereat, and after causing the transferred needle bed to perform a racking action, by repeating the action of returning all knitted loops of the breast to the original needle bed, knitting is performed so as to gradually move the knitted loops of the right or left breast 110a or 120a outward with respect to the center of the torso, whereby the loop transfer actions are performed twice as much as the number of the increases with respect to the same knitted loop when the knitted loops of the breast are transferred.
When the transferring actions are performed many times with respect to the same knitted loop as described above, there arises a problem that yawn is likely damaged.
Also, with the foregoing method for knitting a neckline, although several knitted loops are formed from the side end of the neckline of the final course of each of the right and left breasts 11a and 120a to point L3 shown in FIG. 8, since a part of the final course of each of the right and left breasts 110a and 120a is used for knitting the neckline, the shoulder joining portion is shorter by that much and a back neckline 320 of the back 100b is transversely longer.
When the back neckline 320 of the back 100b is excessively longer, the entire neckline does not have a forwardly hanging shape but falls in a state of extending transversely, thereby causing a problem of being unattractive and unfashionable.